The Mist
Directed by Frank Darabont
Darkwoods Productions, 2007
By Caesar Martini
The Mist is yet another one of Stephen King’s stories adapted to take life on the screen. This is usually a hit-and-miss process, because for every Green Mile or Shawshank Redemption (both directed by Frank Darabont) there seems to be two Dreamcatchers. Thankfully, Frank Darabont helms The Mist, so you can at least be assured that the director has a certain respect and affection for the subject matter.
The Mist is about a — uh, mist — that descends upon a sleepy little town after a big storm. But this is no ordinary mist, OH NO! It’s like the Devil’s fart! Except instead of being smelly, there are crazy demon creatures living in it. Giant bugs and hungry tentacles and such. The film mostly centres around David Drayton (Thomas Jane), an artist who is trapped in a shopping center with his young boy, a bunch of stupid people, a bunch of not-stupid people, and a psychotic, power-hungry, bible-thumping bitch from hell (Marcia Gay Harden). Drayton struggles to keep his son safe from both the monsters outside the stores and the humans within.
I thought The Mist was quite a good film until the last ten minutes or so. I enjoyed the whole mystery of it all, and the human dynamic of a bunch of frightened people all gathered together in one place. The movie succeeds in providing some genuine suspenseful moments and scares, unlike a lot of movies that only succeed in scaring you because they abruptly pop something up on the screen and turn the volume up to eleven. The creatures themselves were creepy and well designed, but I did think that some of them looked a little fake.
Now it’s impossible for me to really discuss what I didn’t like at the end of the movie without ruining it for you, so I’ll just say this: the movie does not end exactly the way the book does (FYI, I haven’t read the book, but I know how it ended because I KNOW THINGS). The way people behave near the climax of the film seemed a little silly to me, and at the very end, I thought to myself, “Well, if you do that and what I think will happen, happens, you’re going to feel pretty fucking stupid,” and I was totally right.
Overall though, these flaws didn’t ruin the movie for me. I thought it was a good adaptation of a Stephen King book, done well by the only guy who seems to be able to consistently do it well. An entertaining flick.
